Although I seldom shoot driven game, a lot of my friends do and I'm always grateful for a brace of oven-ready pheasant. That said, the January 'pheasant fatigue' is now starting to kick-in.
However, there is a very simple way to simplify the cooking process for pheasant, and create delicious, moist, flavoursome meat that can be incorporated into a wide variety of recipes: Stick it in the slow cooker!
Slow-cooking pheasant, and rabbit too for that matter, converts what can be rather dry, sinuous game into flakey, melt-in-the-mouth meat.
I put my last brace of pheasant in the slow cooker along with big chunks of apple and orange, a slosh of cider vinegar, a few mixed herbs and about a pint of water.
Left cooking all day on a low heat, the meat was literally falling off the bone when I got home from work.
Best of all, the pheasant was beautifully infused with the flavours of all the things I'd thrown on the slow cooker with it.
I served the first batch with mashed potato, carrots and broccoli, along with a wonderful gravy made from the meaty/fruity cooking juices left in the slow cooker.
The following lunchtime, the flaked turkey made great sandwiches with lettuce and mayonnaise. And there was just enough left to make a nice supper when stirred into a wok-ful of fried onions and mushrooms and finished off with a big slosh of double cream and a drop of sherry. Served on rice, it made for a great pheasant dish.
Give it a go...
